"Making music is like constructing a machine whose function it is to dredge up emotions in performer and listener alike. Some people find this idea repulsive, because it seems to relegate the artist to the level of trickster, manipulator, and deciever -- a kind of self-justifying onanist. They would prefer to see music as an expression of emotion Rather than a generator of it, to believe in the artist as someone with something to say. I'm beginning to think of the artist as someone who is adept at making devices that tap into our shared psychological make-up and that trigger the deeply moving parts we have in common. In that case the conventional idea of authorship is questionalble. Not that I don't want credit for the songs I've written, but what constitutes authorship is maybe not what we would like it to be. This queasiness about rethinking how music works is also connected with the idea of authenticity." David Bryne, How Music Works.

 Reviews aside - I find the book interesting. Bryne discusses some of the very issues that I spend a lot of time talking through with students. AND. Dancing to Burning Down the House, I discovered, is just as much fun decades later as it was the first time. Great concert in Milwaukee last night - thank you!!